A Wilkinson County man is in jail after he was arrested three times in less than three weeks for DUI.
Michael Joseph Beckham, 52, of Ivey, is being held without bond in Putnam County Jail, facing the charge of driving under the influence of drugs, third offense, according to jail reports.
Around 8:35 a.m. on Dec. 4, Eatonton Police Department Officer Dillon Waldroup responded to a call on Old Milledgeville Road. The complaint was that a gray sedan was driving recklessly, according to Waldroup’s report.
When he arrived, Waldroup reportedly saw the gray 2014 Honda Accord pull forward into the Dairy Queen parking lot and stop. A check of the license plate revealed the car belonged to Beckham.
Beckham told Waldroup that he had just dropped his wife off at work nearby and planned to wait in the restaurant’s parking lot until she got off work. As the officer was checking Beckham’s license, a Putnam County Sheriff’s Office deputy arrived on scene and informed him that Beckham had recently been stopped on two previous DUI charges, one in Baldwin County and one in Putnam County.
“Immediately after hearing this, Mr. Beckham could be heard from inside the car inhaling what sounded like an air duster,” Waldroup wrote in his report.
Waldroup asked Beckham what he did with the can, but “he seemed very confused.”
Eatonton Police Officer Aaron Temples conducted a Standardized Field Sobriety Test, during which Beckham showed several signs of impairment, according to the incident report. Temples read the Implied Consent warning, but Beckham refused to take a breath, blood, or urine test. In Georgia, refusing to take the test means an automatic driver’s license suspension.
Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills said Beckham was arrested by one of his deputies on Nov. 14 and bonded out. Eatonton Police Chief Howell Cardwell said he was arrested in Baldwin County on Nov. 20 for the same charge. Because the arrest in Eatonton was his third, no bond was set.